


Once More (into the breach)

by AngeNoir



Series: Peapod McHanzo Week 2019 [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Peapod McHanzo Week, The Drift (Pacific Rim), lost limbs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-05
Updated: 2019-01-05
Packaged: 2019-10-05 00:44:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17314886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngeNoir/pseuds/AngeNoir
Summary: Jesse isn't quite sure why the hell Genji Shimada, the guy he was in the medbay with for so long, would actually ask him to be okay trying to drift with his brother, the asshole who put Genji in the medbay in the first place.Then Jesse meets said asshole, and, well.





	Once More (into the breach)

“Give him a try.”

“He’s the one that  _ put _ you in that wheelchair all those years ago, Genji. He’s the reason yer more’n 60% bionic. He damn well destroyed your entire body!”

Genji folded his arms - one biotic, one organic - and glowered at Jesse. “We are without many, many pilots. We are without any funding. We have  _ nothing _ . If we don’t do this now, if we don’t find you a drift partner, we have only three functioning Jaegers. Do you think we can close the breach with  _ three. Functioning. Jaegers? _

“I don’t think y’can close the breach at all,” Jesse grumbled, folding his arms - one also biotic, the other organic - and glaring at the floor.

The damning part of it was that Genji was right. Ever since the UN pulled Jaeger funding, there were no more applicants to the program, no more new or improved Jaegers being built. What sat in this hangar was what the aging commander Jack Morrison could pull from various scrap piles around the world and cobble together. The most complete and intact Jaeger, Sounding Mecha, belonged to a three-person team that were still very, very young - the most mismatched and held-together-with-glue-and-a-prayer Jaeger was Flame Hook.

In the middle of that line-up, closer to the complete side, was Jesse’s old Jaeger.

Deadeye Blaster had been his and Ashe’s Jaeger, up until a fearsome battle with Razortusk that tore off the arm of the Jaeger - in the process, crushing and mangling Jesse’s own arm. They had managed to hold off the kaiju, but barely; reinforcements from further up the coast had come in. Hellfire Pulse had come to their rescue but Jesse had been laid up for months - months that good pilots had been needed. Ashe moved on, found another Jaeger partner, and Jesse, neurons and body shaken by what had transpired, had tried to quietly fade away.

A companion of his in the medbay at the time had been one Genji Shimada, flown in from Japan where he had suffered severe Jaeger- and kaiju-related injuries. He and his elder brother had been piloting the Jaeger known as Dragon Fang, fighting a kaiju named Akuro, when Akura had suddenly retreated into the ocean. The orders had been to return to shore and wait; Genji had insisted that Akuro, clearly adapted to swimming, would simply attack at a different spot, much faster than Dragon Fang could redeploy, and so it would be best to stay. The two brothers had fought, bitterly, falling out of alignment. The Jaeger had turned on itself; Akuro, apparently sensing weakness - or simply still close enough to see - had surged back up out of the water and decimated the uncontrolled Jaeger. Both brothers had been wounded, though Genji had been flown to America for treatment under the renowned bio-organic scientist Angela Ziegler. 

Genji had complained, bitterly, to Jesse. Jesse was inclined to agree with Genji; his brother sounded like an asshole of huge proportions.

And now, here was Genji as their LOCCENT officer and eye in the sky, asking Jesse to take the compatibility test with his asshole brother.

“Look. I am glad of your loyalty, Jesse. You are one of the best men I have ever known. And I am aware… that Hanzo and I have had difficulties. Hell, he nearly refused coming here because of our history. But Morrison needs pilots, and I can think of no one better to pilot the Deadeye Blaster except you, and the only other pilot we have on hand that is trained and ready for deployment is my brother. Perhaps you take the test, and you are not compatible. That is the end of it. I would not ask you to force a connection that you clearly do not share.”

Jesse snorted. “Y’ferget that I’ve helped ya with your prosthetics? I watched ya take yer first steps outta that wheelchair? I was there when you were screamin’ bloody murder at everyone an’ everything. I ain’t gonna forgive ‘im so easily.”

Heaving a robotic sigh - because, yes, even Genji’s  _ throat _ had been damaged, and so much of his inner tissue was bio-organic that he never saw a doctor anymore  _ except _ cyborg specialists, like Ziegler, or O’Deorain, or Tekhartha - Genji tapped his fingers against his inorganic bicep. “I am asking for  _ me _ . I have come to peace with what has happened. I am asking you, as your friend, for you to do the same.”

That was a low blow, and Jesse yanked his hat down further over his eyes, storming away. “I’ll do it,” he snarled over his shoulder, “but like hell am I gonna put in more’n a token effort.”

 

* * *

 

Later, he would not remember the actual fight. He wouldn’t remember the steps he took, or the choices he made.

Instead, all he would remember was the intricate dance, the way that he  _ knew _ , instinctively, which way Hanzo Shimada would jump, which way he would dodge. He would remember his blood singing in his ears, his anger and hatred falling away as he realized Hanzo Shimada could also read his motions, follow his patterns. They whirled like yin and yang, like mirror reflections, points scored through the skin of their teeth rather than with ease.

Jesse would remember the pure pleasure, the skill, the  _ satisfaction _ on Hanzo Shimada’s face, the way his stiff muscles and blank expression loosened, came alive,  _ vibrated _ with energy and excitement and pleasure.

Jesse would only remember his partner, and how right everything felt.

 

* * *

 

“I didn’t want Hanzo Shimada for you.”

Jesse stood at parade rest in front of Morrison’s desk. On the desk sat a picture of a man both Morrison and Jesse knew very well - Morrison’s old partner, Gabriel Reyes, the man who had seen potential in Jesse and pulled him into the Jaeger program. Jesse focused on the picture, and considered his response.

“I still don’t want Hanzo Shimada for you,” Morrison sighed. “He’s… fussy, and too controlled. I remember you and Ashe. I remember your easy connection, and the way that you orbited each other. Outside the Kwoon, you two are at each other’s throats, snipping and snapping and growling away. I have enough shit on my plate that I can’t handle you adding to that load.”

“Permission to speak freely, commander?”

“When the hell did permission come into any of it, McCree?” Morrison sighed.

With a soft snort, Jesse didn’t raise his eyes, but he clicked his tongue. “Look, you ain’t exactly swimming in viable candidates, fer me or fer ‘im. I ain’t all that pleased with ‘im, either, an’ I know he ain’t happy with me. But we gotta shitton of bigger things ta deal with than whether I like the guy. We work t’gether. We can do this.”

Morrison drummed his fingers on the table, staring at the same picture Jesse’s eyes were trained on, and then he let out a world-weary sigh. “We’ll try the handshake, see what happens,” he gruffed. “I don’t want to lose you, kid.”

“I don’t wanna be lost,” Jesse replied frankly.

That startled a bark of laughter out of Morrison, and he ran a hand over his thinning, white hair. “Yeah. I suppose you wouldn’t.”

 

* * *

 

“If you don’t mind, I’d prefer to take this side. My left side…” Jesse trailed off, shaking the inorganic arm a little, then smiled wryly. “It’s not my best side.”

“It is all the same to me,” Hanzo said serenely. He looked unflappable as always, but Jesse was paying attention to the shorter man - the the tenseness in his face, the grip of his fingers around the parts as he hooked himself up into the left side harness.

“Right. You ready for this?” Jesse asked, hearing the trial run initiation sequence cycle on.

A snort, and then that calm voice again, “In moments you will be able to see for yourself how ready I am.”

The rush of energy, the connection, washed over him, familiar in such a deep way that Jesse breathed in a sigh of welcome, of  _ home _ . He grew up on this, in this,  _ doing _ this. He felt the first initial rush, the dusty desert sky stretched wide with stars that suddenly were filled with cherry blossom petals, learning at the knee of his grandfather, telling the history of his ancestors, bleeding into tutors and textbooks and teachers, kanji painstakingly written by calligraphy pens, children’s laughter and the happiness of knowing that they were doing it,  _ they were doing it _ .

He looked down at their hands, the double images smoothly aligning, feeling the echo of having two hands and knowing deep in his bones that Hanzo was feeling the weight of the bionic arm. With wordless, instant agreement, they brought their fists up, slid their leg back, readied the Jaeger.

They were a team, like how--

Ashe was suddenly there, present, a ghost in his mind screaming his name as the left side of the Jaeger crumpled under alien teeth. Jesse stumbled back in his harness, seeing her honey-gold eyes widen in fear, black hair falling around--

Not black hair.

Ashe hated her blond hair. Had bleached it.

Not black hair.

_ Hanzo _ , he remembered, even as he realized his headset was vibrating with how intensely Genji was shouting into it.

“ -  _ out of alignment, Jesse, Hanzo, you are both out of alignment -  _ ”

“ ‘M good,” Jesse mumbled, clearing the heaviness from his tongue. “I got it. I’m sorry. I’ve got it now.”

“ _ You might have, but Hanzo is still way out! _ ”

Jesse, shoving Ashe back and away to the side, looked over and saw Hanzo’s wide, sightless eyes, staring forward.

“Hanzo, don’t engage! Hanzo, c’mon, you’re better’n this. Don’t watch the memory. Feel what’s under your hands, what’s against your back. Stay with me, darlin’.”

But even as he spoke, Jesse felt the pull, the tug, of the memory, the dragging of it at his subconsciousness. He could pull away from it, but breaking the alignment on his end without concurrent breaking on Hanzo’s end could burn the neural pathways of Hanzo’s mind; pulling away from the memory without breaking the alignment would cause the Jaeger to turn on itself, two halves not in coordination with each other.

So he chased after Hanzo, into a nightmare.

_ The air was cold, frigidly so. Winter in Japan could be devastating, and even with the thermal insulation, Hanzo would swear he felt the cold in his feet, in his fingers, in his nose. _

_ “If we let it go, it’s going to attack elsewhere! Hanzo, you know I’m right!” _

_ The LOCCENT officer’s voice repeated the command to return to base, to withdraw. The fight with Akuro had already damaged their radar systems, much of their weaponry. If they engaged, they were unlikely to win. _

_ “You’re not  _ listening _ to me, anija, you have to trust me! You saw that tail, and the webbing between those claws; you know it’s not retreating. It’s a strong swimmer; the longer we hesitate, the more a headstart it has! Aomori is too close, if it heads north, and you know Russia’s Jaeger is occupied elsewhere at the moment. It’s just us!” _

_ “We can’t disobey our commanding officer,” Hanzo said, staring at the screaming instruments, the stormy sea, feeling the cold creep over him. _

“This is just a memory. Hanzo, this happened before. It’s not real.”

_ “You never trust me! You’re not my father, Hanzo, you don’t get to tell me what to do!” _

_ “We cannot disobey our commanding officer! Our orders are to withdraw, Genji.” _

_ Hanzo could feel the alignment shift, could  _ feel _ the Jaeger shift, and he didn’t know what to do. He stared into his brother’s brown eyes, begging him to listen, to work with him. _

_ “Our orders are because Hanamura HQ is not here, is not seeing what we saw, does not know what we know!” _

_ “They have our readings, they know what we saw - ” _

_ “The order is a bad order, Hanzo! Why can’t you trust me?!” _

_ Frozen, just like their Jaeger, Akuro rose from the depths and slammed into their chest. _

_ Gasping, Hanzo jerked his arm up, calling up the electropulse canon the Dragon Fang was equipped with, the only weapon still working, but they were out of alignment, they couldn’t fire it, they couldn’t  _ aim  _ it, and Akuro’s claws dug into the torso of their Jaeger, sending pain signals rocketing through their harnesses. _

_ Genji screamed. _

“Hanzo, darlin’, I needja ta open those pretty eyes fer me. I needja ta look at me, sweetheart. It’s just a memory. It’s over.”

_ The scent of salt water stung his nostrils, and Hanzo desperately reached, and reached, and  _ reached  _ for the handshake, for his little brother who was shrieking in pain, and he reached-- _

_ And someone grasped his hand. _

Jesse let out a deep breath, feeling the surroundings melt away the handshake between him and Hanzo steadying. The Jaeger around them shuddered, then went to rest.

_ Neural handshake successful. Alignment at one hundred percent. Test successful. _

Jesse turned to meet the eyes of Hanzo, and this time, he knew he would see echoes of Ashe around the corner, knew Hanzo would always see echoes of Genji - but they were  _ here _ , in the moment, with each other.

Hanzo grinned weakly.  _ That wasn’t so hard, was it? _

_ Says you, partner, _ Jesse responded laughingly, as Genji’s voice was saying something about success and disengaging.

Maybe this would work out after all.


End file.
